Writing memos

Writing memos

BIOINF 2202: Dental Informatics Seminar
Instructors: Titus Schleyer, Heiko Spallek

Why learn about writing memos?
• important form of corporate
communication
• clear and concise communication of
complex subjects
• writing style and approach applicable to
other communications, such as email
• set yourself apart from people who cannot
write
Center for Dental Informatics
University of Pittsburgh School of Dental Medicine 2 of 28

Purpose of a memo
• “solve problems” by:
– informing
– persuading
– refuting
– arguing
– analyzing
–…
• Recipients: one person, several persons,
one or more groups, a whole community

General rules
• keep your audience in mind
• follow a structure (see below)
• follow an outline
• get to the point early
• revising is easier than writing perfectly the first
time
• follow style guides and writing manuals
• budget between 20 min – 1 hr for most memos


Memo plan

} Header
Subject line
Opening paragraph

} Supporting details/explanation

Closing


Header
• To: recipient (individuals and/or
groups)
• From: you/office (e.g. “Student Affairs”)/group
(e.g. “Social Committee”)
• CC: more recipient(s)
• Date:
• use correct names/designations for recipients
• include titles when appropriate, for all recipients
when possible

Subject line
• probably the most important part of your
memo
• summarize the intent of your memo, e.g.:
– “Request for assistance with grant project”
– “Consequences of recent material thefts”
• specific, concise and to the point


Opening paragraph
• complete summary of your memo
• provide:
– context
– task/action/request
– summary of the rest of the memo
• Best: put your intent into the first sentence


Supporting details/explanation
• maintain a global structure, such as
findings  implications  action items
• arrange facts in a logical order
• don’t provide more detail than necessary
• use bullet points where appropriate
• use correct structure bullet points (e.g. no
standalone bullets)


Closing
• If necessary, summarize what you want
recipient(s) to do.
• Provide clear instructions, including
deadlines where applicable.
• Provide further references/contact
information when appropriate.


In-class exercise 1: Critique a
memo

Review Institutional Advancement Memo –
Version 1 for compliance with the rules just
discussed.


Writing style
“It now appears that obligatory obfuscation is a
firm tradition within the medical profession. …
[Medical writing] is a highly skilled, calculated
attempt to confuse the reader. … A doctor feels he
might get passed over for an assistant
professorship because he wrote his papers too
clearly—because he made his ideas seem too
simple.”
Michael Crichton, NEJM


More about writing style
“There are times when the more the authors
explain, the less we understand. Apes
certainly seem capably of using language to
communicate. Whether scientists are
remains doubtful.”
Douglas Chadwick, NYT


Example
Our lack of data prevented evaluation of
state actions in targeting funds to areas in
need of assistance.

 Because we lacked data, we could not
evaluate whether the state had targeted
funds to areas that needed assistance.


Clarity: Actions
• Use subjects to name your central
characters.
• Express their most important actions as
verbs.


Verb  Noun = Nominalization
Examples:
discover  discovery
resist  resistance
different  difference
proficient  proficiency

Nominalization makes for a noun-heavy writing
style that is complex and hard to understand.


How to fix it
• Diagnosis
• Analysis
• Revision
(J. Williams, Style, p. 54, 55)


Please fix:
The agency conducted an investigation into
the matter.
 The agency investigated the matter.
There was first a review of the evolution of
the dorsal fin.
 First, she reviewed how the dorsal fin
evolved.


Use characters as your subjects
• A character is whatever entity you can tell
a story about, such as:
– you
– the school
– the Executive Committee
– the Democratic party
– freedom of speech
– health care costs


Active vs. passive voice

Choose the passive voice when you don’t
know who did it, your readers don’t care
who did it, or you don’t want them to know
who did it.


Example
 Those who are found guilty can be fined.

 Once the design was publicized, it was
widely adopted.


A style that seems complex …
•
 may be necessary to express complex
ideas precisely.
• may gratuitously complicate already
complex ideas.
• may gratuitously complex simple ideas.


Cohesion
• Move from old information to new.
• Arrange topics in a logical order.
• Start sentences with ideas that you have
already described, or with something you
can safely assume the reader already
knows.
• Keep your topics short and reasonably
consistent.

Syntactic complexity
• In general, readers best comprehend long
complex units after they have read a
relatively short and clear subject+verb
sequence.
• Place technical terms new to the reader
not at the beginning, but towards the end
of the sentence.


Example
To help in the efforts of ABCO, Inc., to develop
medical policies in regard to coverage of
employees engaged in high-risk activities, Dr.
Jones has served as a medical consultant.

 Dr. Jones has served as a medical consultant to
help ABCO, Inc., develop medical policies in
regard to coverage of employees engaged in
high-risk activities.


Clarity, grace and concision
• Delete words that mean little or nothing.
• Delete words that repeat other words.
• Delete words whose meaning the reader
can infer from other words.
• Replace a phrase with a word.
• Change unnecessary negatives to
affirmatives.


Homework

Rewrite Institutional Advancement Memo –
Version 2 for compliance with the guidelines
discussed in the lecture.


Resources
• Williams, J. Style: Ten Lessons in Clarity and
Grace (7th Ed.), Longman, New York, 2002
• Pitt style guide:
www.umc.pitt.edu/umc/styleguide/contents.html
• Merriam Webster’s Manual for Writers and
Editors, Merriam-Webster, Inc., Springfield, MA
1998
• Siegal, AM and Connolly, W. The New York
Times Manual of Style and Usage, Random
House, New York, 1999


Writing memos

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